


a little bird told me

by rythyme (pugglemuggle)



Category: Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020)
Genre: Alcohol, F/F, Fluff, Getting Together, Kissing, Living Together, Multi, Polyamory, Post-Movie, and they were roommates!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-10
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:20:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22646302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pugglemuggle/pseuds/rythyme
Summary: So here's the thing.Harley isn’t looking for a relationship—but when three fun, sexy, bad-ass lady friends are living with you in your shithole apartment above the closed-down Dollar Store... Well, maybe relationships findyou.(Or, they all live together in an apartment, and Harley starts to think she might be in love with her friends.)
Relationships: Dinah Lance/Harleen Quinzel, Helena Bertinelli/Dinah Lance/Renee Montoya/Harleen Quinzel, Helena Bertinelli/Harleen Quinzel, Renee Montoya/Harleen Quinzel
Comments: 77
Kudos: 601





	a little bird told me

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Day 8 of my personal fic challenge, "Fourteen First Dates: The February Fourteen Fandom Challenge." I saw Birds of Prey yesterday so i booted whatever other fandom was in this slot and decided to write this instead. So. Sorry Marvel lmao

So here’s the thing.

Harley isn’t looking for a relationship right now. For the first time in her life she’s  _ enjoying _ being single, and it’s  _ so _ much fun! She parties as much as she wants, wears whatever she wants, flirts with whoever she wants... And she’s been making a lot more female friends than she’s had, like, ever. That’s honestly been one of the best parts about the whole Breaking-Up-With-The-Joker thing. Before, all her friends were just Joker’s friends. Now she’s got an apprentice and three fun, sexy, bad-ass lady friends of her own.

And that’s where a few unexpected twists come in.

Harley isn’t looking for a relationship—but when three fun, sexy, bad-ass lady friends are living with you in your super secret base, A.K.A. your shithole apartment above the closed-down Dollar Store... Well, maybe relationships find  _ you. _

♢♥♢

It takes half a second for Helena to one-eighty from total fuckin’ badass to weird awkward emo person, and it’s kind of giving Harley whiplash. 

One minute, Helena is Capital-‘H’-Huntress, shooting three different dudes with her crossbow and stabbing a guy in the leg without even messing up her hair. The next minute, she’s wandering into Harley’s kitchen in a sports bra and grungy sweatpants, asking Harley what a Pop-Tart is.

“You don’t know what a Pop-Tart is?” Harley squints at her. “They have Pop-Tarts in Italy, you know.”

“No they don’t.”

“Yeah, they fuckin’ do, they’re not—” Harley groans. “Fine. They’re just a pastry thing with different flavored fillings. You put ‘em in the toaster.” She picks up a silver Pop-Tart package from the counter, rips it open, and sticks it in her barely functional toaster. “See?”

Helena glares at her through smudged eyeliner, but makes no comment. Harley hops up onto the counter and sips at her coffee while the toaster heats up. They wait in silence for a minute or two, and then the toaster clicks off and the Pop-Tart jumps up, only slightly burnt. 

“Looks good, huh?” Harley says with a smile. Helena eyes the Pop-Tart a little skeptically.

“It’s hot,” Helena says.

“No shit. It was just in the toaster. Wait for it to cool down.”

“I know. I’m not five.” Helena huffs. She waits a half a minute or so before retrieving the Pop-Tart and tucking it into a paper towel that Harley graciously supplies to her. Then she takes a bite.

The quiet amazement on Helena’s face is downright adorable.

“You like it?” Harley asks, even though she knows the answer. Helena, however, doesn’t pick up on the teasing. She nods earnestly, mouth already full with another bite.

It’s not really fair for someone to be cute and sexy at the same time, Harley thinks, but Helena seems to have both in spades. She’s standing here in Harley’s kitchen, biceps out, smoky eyes, washboard abs on proud display—and yet at the same time she’s losing her shit over a Pop-Tart like it’s the first piece of food she’s seen in a year. It’s dumb, but also cute. It kind of makes Harley want to kiss her.

Huh.

She waits until Helena has finished her first Pop-Tart and is in the middle of heating up another. Then she taps Helena’s shoulder. “Hey, Huntress. I want to ask you something,” she says, gesturing with her chin for Helena to come closer. Helena does, though her eyes are a little skeptical. 

“Why do I need to be over here for you to ask me something?” she asks. 

“Because then I wouldn’t be able to ask you properly.” And then Harley leans in close, her lips just an inch away from Helena’s. “Can I kiss you?”

Helena blinks at her, eyes wide. “Why?”

Harley shrugs. “Because you’re adorable, and I like having you around. And I want to. Don’t overthink it.”

“Okay,” Helena agrees. 

So Harley closes the distance.

♢♥♢

“You’re a pretty wild son of a bitch, you know that?” Harley teases Renee one evening. The others have gone to bed already, and now Harley and Renee are working their way through a plastic convenience store bottle of booze while they watch one of Renee’s favorite crime dramas. It’s not actually that bad—the booze, that is. The crime show is fuckin’ terrible.

“Are you really calling me crazy?” Renee asks with a raised eyebrow. She’s really good at raising her eyebrow. Must be a prerequisite for becoming a detective.

“Takes one to know one,” Harley replies. She takes another big gulp from their bottle. “That time at the Boobytrap? You just showed up drunk with a gun and tried to fight me. That’s a classic Harley move.”

“I wasn’t drunk,” Renee protests, then amends, a little sheepishly, “Not  _ that _ drunk.”

“I’m not judging,” Harley says, putting her hands up placatingly. “I’m impressed, actually. See, Canary’s got her head screwed on pretty straight, and Huntress—well, she’s kind of batshit too, but a predictable kind of batshit, you know?” She sighs and leans further back into the couch. “You and me, we’re the fun kind of batshit.”

“Pretty sure the ‘fun kind of batshit’ is why all my partners have broken up with me,” Renee says. 

Harley hands her the bottle. Renee takes a long swig.

“Well, they’re missing out,” Harley says eventually. “Because you’re hot as hell. And also I think your batshit-ness is pretty fuckin’ great.”

Renee gives her an odd look at that. Harley isn’t really sure what to make of it. 

They drink a little while longer, making it through another awful episode of Renee’s crime show. Harley isn’t sure if this thing is better or worse while drunk. Worse, probably. She’s pretty sure she figured out who the real killer was in the first five minutes. She turns towards Renee. “Hey, Montoya—” she asks, because Renee will know if she’s right about who the killer is, but Harley doesn’t get to finish. Instead, Renee leans forward and kisses her.

Oh.  _ Oh. _

Sometimes in life, you get surprises. Sometimes, you even get good surprises. When Harley gets a good surprise, she’s inclined to roll with it.

So Harley kisses back.

♢♥♢

“Canary,” Harley says, pouting as she steps into the apartment’s small living room. Dinah is sitting on the couch, looking at something on her phone. She puts it down when Harley walks in and sighs.

“What is it, Harley?”

"I’m out of booze." Harley flounces to the couch and flops over the arm to bounce on the couch's middle cushion, then scoots back a bit to lay her head on Dinah's lap. Dinah stares down at her, unimpressed, but doesn't push her off. 

“I’m not picking up more for you, you know,” Dinah says. “You still owe me for stealing my car.”

Harley clutches a hand over her heart. “Canary! I thought we were past that! Besides, I gave it back.”

“You gave it back with  _ three parking tickets _ , a giant dent in the bumper, and an empty tank of gas. I had to pick it up from the tow yard.”

“See? That’s giving it back.”

Dinah rolls her eyes and goes back to her phone. 

Harley looks up at Dinah. Her hair is pulled up in a bun on the top of her head, and her tank top is soft and comfortable. Her lipstick looks amazing. How is it that Harley made such hot friends?

“This is a good view, Harley says. Dinah raises her eyebrows. “I just mean you’re pretty. I’m not checking out your rack—although your rack always looks pretty fuckin’ spectacular.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Harley sighs, repositioning herself a little on Dinah’s lap. Something is making it hard to get comfortable. After a couple moments, she realizes it’s her ponytail digging into the back of her skull, so she reaches around and pulls out the hairband, letting her hair spread back across the couch.

A few minutes later, Dinah starts running her fingers through it.

Harley’s not even sure if Dinah knows she’s doing it, since she still seems to be doing something on her phone—Candy Crush, maybe? Still, it feels  _ nice.  _ Really nice. She can’t remember the last time someone touched her like this: soft, gentle, tender. Loving. Harley blinks a couple times, trying to get rid of the sudden pricking at the corner of her eyes.

“What’s that look for?” Dinah asks without looking at her. Harley shakes her head and shrugs, her shoulders bumping Dinah’s leg. 

“Nothing,” she says quietly. “Just...this is nice.”

Dinah’s fingers pause in Harley’s hair. She looks down at her, her expression unusually soft. “I’m really glad I met you,” she murmurs. “Things would’ve been a lot different if I hadn’t.”

“You could say that.” Harley grins up at her. 

She isn’t really sure who moves first. Harley lifts her head upwards a little at the same time that Dinah tilts her head down. Their lips meet, just the barest brush of lips, and then Dinah’s hand moves to rest on Harley’s cheek, and Harley leans into the touch and deepens the kiss. 

♢♥♢

So maybe Harley falls for all of her friends. She loves them, and they love her, and who really cares where the division between “best friend” and “lover” is, anyway? It seems pretty arbitrary. Harley never really did care much for societal norms.

Still, Cass’s face is priceless when she finally finds out. Harley gets the whole thing on video. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments and kudos are always appreciated <3

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] a little bird told me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24299044) by [Amanita_Fierce](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amanita_Fierce/pseuds/Amanita_Fierce), [ArwenLune](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArwenLune/pseuds/ArwenLune), [carboncopies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/carboncopies/pseuds/carboncopies), [gracicah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gracicah/pseuds/gracicah), [Nrandom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nrandom/pseuds/Nrandom), [olive2pod (olive2read)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/olive2read/pseuds/olive2pod)




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